What if you could erase your past mistakes? All it would take is for you to play a simple card game and figure out the hidden rules. Yes, you’d be tearing apart reality itself, but isn’t that worth it? This is the premise of Occlude, where a card game similar to Solitaire, including 4 mysterious self-moving coins, stands between regret and relief. Or does it?
Occlude comes to us from the small UK/US indie team at Tributary Games, whose previous title, King of the Castle, was highly praised by our EIC, Stuart. I’ve been enjoying my puzzle games recently, so I’m looking forward to racking my brain again.
Occult Cards & Concealed Rules
Join me as I doubt my intelligence and fight with RNG while making my way through this occult puzzler.
Gameplay
Do you know the rules of Solitaire? Good, forget them. While Occlude may be loosely based on Solitaire/Patience, or Klondike to be more specific, there are enough differences to make this a distinct variant.
Here’s a brief summary of how to play. 44 cards — a full deck minus aces and kings — are dealt out face-up as the tableau in 8 ascending length columns; 2, 3, 4, 5 … 9. The aces and kings are placed to one side, forming a double ended foundation for each suit. 4 mysterious coins are placed above the tableau, each in a double-spaced area, and there’s one empty card space, called purgatory.
Now we know what all the elements are, how do we win? Each card at the bottom of a column in the tableau can be moved; either to another column where a card of the same suit but one rank higher or lower is the bottom card, to purgatory, or to the foundation if it is the next rank up or down. Once all the cards of a suit are on the foundation, the final card will straddle the 2 piles and becomes the all important Final Card for that suit. Complete all the foundations and the game is over.
But what about those strange coins?
I’m so glad you asked! This is where Occlude occludes the rules. I came up with that pun all by myself!
As you are organising the cards during a Ritual, sometimes one or more coins may move or flip. These changes need to be deciphered to identify which card in each suit should be the Final Card, and therefore moved to the Foundation last. Doing this correctly will earn you the coin for that suit. Don’t worry, you can mark cards to help you keep track. I did this to highlight the Final Cards once I’d figured them out. In theory, this should prevent accidentally moving those to the Foundation early. Although, I’m clearly beyond help and still made mistakes right at the end of Rituals, undoing my hard work.
Each round of Occlude presents a short story, telling you why someone is playing the game; what they want to correct in their lives. Depending on how many coins you earn will alter the outcome of the story, with three endings for each level. You’ll need to collect all 4 coins in the same round to unlock the ‘best’ ending and also earn an Archive. These Archives contain additional lore and secrets, along with important hints for solving the final Ritual. I don’t think I’d have stood a chance at finishing the game without them.
Dealing with the Rules
The rules for each Ritual will take varying times to figure out. Personally, I cracked Rituals 3 and 6 quickly, but the others took me longer. There were definitely times when I felt I just wouldn’t be able to figure out why those coins were moving; how could there be rhyme or reason to this randomness. Eventually, through determined persistence (read: stubbornness) I did it. Thankfully, the difficulty curve was very fair, with the rules getting gradually more obtuse and complex.
For additional clues, pay attention to the Focuses — the small mementos that appear as icons for each Ritual — they may hold clues to the solution. I think Ritual 6 in particular will stump people. It might even be a little cruel. The only reason I was able to solve it in a short time was because of my day job.
A Minor Frustration
At the beginning of the game, you’re told that all the deals are difficult but solvable. However, once you account for your limited ability to undo moves (in Classic mode at least, Story mode allows full undo) and keeping the Final Cards in play to get all 4 coins, the randomness of the cards in each deal can lead to some tedium. You are expected to resort to fresh deals while working towards completion, but at times I felt stuck in a bit of a loop, especially when I knew the rules and was just waiting on a good set of cards. It’s also a little disheartening when one false move can ruin your chance at 4 coins. But, them’s the breaks.
I know that’s a bit of a whinge, but it didn’t ruin my enjoyment of Occlude. I relished the challenge of figuring out the rules for each Ritual. My pen and paper were very useful for the final round.
Graphics & Audio
Occlude has a clean, fairly minimal, visual presentation. Most of the game is spent in the Rituals, where you’re interacting with the spread of cards. All the elements of this card game section are clearly identifiable. Even though the game uses a standard deck of cards, all suits are different colours to help with recognition. For some reason, my brain had trouble with the purple diamonds cards. Other than that, it was easy enough to scan and located different suits and ranks. It’s also abundantly clear when a coin has moved and flipped, with a lightening or dimming effect applied. The notes and clues hidden on the Archives papers are also legible, and colour coded, to help pull out information required for the final Ritual.
There are not a lot of music or sounds in the game, but the backing music really helps to set the scene. It’s an unsettling piece with a slow piano melody and effects that sound like shuffling feet, or whispers, or heavy breathing. It’s quite unnerving at times. The sound effect when you accidentally put a Final Card onto the Foundation too soon also acts as a jump scare. Well, at least it did for me, giving me a jolt of surprise out of both general anxiety and annoyance at making a mistake.
One glaring omission from Occlude though, is the lack of a parade of bouncing cards covering the screen at the end of a round. For shame, Tributary Games!
Longevity
I was able to complete the Rituals in around 7 hours. As with any puzzle game, your time may differ depending on how well you pick up the rules and work out the secrets. The game is priced appropriately and fairly for it’s content. For further enjoyment, or torture, there are 11 Steam achievements. You’re unlikely to pick them all up during a regular playthrough, so you can go back and work on those if you’d like that 100% completion mark.
Final Thoughts
Occlude is an enjoyable, challenging-yet-beatable, puzzle game. It doesn’t shy away from telling you to expect to find it difficult. Equally, it encourages you to continue forward in the face of setbacks. The mechanics and general rules of play are easy to pick up, and the differing rules of each Ritual can be deciphered with trial-and-error. The story elements didn’t fully engage me, unfortunately, and felt like decoration to stop the game being simply a procession of levels. However, if you do play and want to explore more of the narrative, there may be additional secrets to discover, perhaps using the ‘Evidence’ that’s being released slowly on the Steam Community page.
After all is said and done, Occlude is a tight, well-polished experience. I’d recommend this to players who enjoy a challenge where logic and deduction skills are essential.
Occlude receives the Thumb Culture Gold Award. Happy dealings!
Disclaimer: A code was received in order to write this review.
For a more relaxing puzzle game, why not check out A Building Full of Cats 2?
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